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Introduction

A Runaway Girl (Gaiety, 21 May 1898) starred Ellaline Terriss as orphan Winifred Grey, who runs away from her Corsican convent to escape a promised marriage. She falls in with a group of bandits-cum-wandering minstrels and falls in love with another of its temporary members, who needless to say turns out to be the promised husband-to-be. The show opens in a wood outside Winifred’s convent, where she confesses to an addiction to tobacco in the charming The sly cigarette. Then, in Venice in Act 2, she offers the incidental The boy guessed right. Like other Gaiety shows, this too played in Austria, Hungary and Germany, as well as around the English-speaking world.

Recordings

Lionel Monckton was among the finest British melodists, ranking as such with the likes of Arthur Sullivan and Ivor Novello. This new recording is the perfect introduction to his charming songs and features soloists Catherine Bott and Richard Suart—th ...» More

Winifred: If girls and boys
Were asked what joys
They found the most entrancing,
Each boy would name
His favourite game,
From ‘Ducks and Drakes’ to dancing;
But girls with me
Would all agree,
Although you’ll think I’m joking,
With twinkling eye
They’d make reply,
‘The best of all is smoking.’ Ah!

Winifred / Chorus: Oh, sly cigarette!
Oh fie, cigarette!
Why did you teach me to love you so,
When I have to pretend that I don’t, you know?

Winifred: Oh, after school
To garden cool
How sweet it is to vanish;
To dream away
Our time of play,
In smoke our lessons banish.
My head you turn’d
When first I learn’d
My little friend to pet you;
I coughed and chok’d
Each time I smok’d,
But still I’m glad I met you. Ah!

Winifred / Chorus: Oh, sly cigarette …

Aubrey Hopwood (1863-1917)Greenbank, Harry (1865-1899)

No 18: The boy guessed right
There once was a little boy who went to school

Winifred: There once was a little boy who went to school,
And he was an aggravating lad!
He smash’d every window and he broke each rule;
His behaviour was really very bad.
So the master invited him to come one day,
For a private little interview;
And he welcomed master Jack,
With his hand behind his back,
Saying ‘Guess what I’ve got for you!’

Winifred / Chorus: And the boy guessed right the very first time,
He guessed right away it was not a cricket bat,
I wonder how he came to think of that!

Winifred: That boy grew older and he fell in love,
With a girl just as pretty as a rose,
He was sure he adored her all the world above,
But yet he was frightened to propose.
He paid her some tender little compliments,
Said her eyes were of a lovely blue,
So the maiden growing bolder,
Laid her head upon his shoulder,
Saying ‘Guess how I dream of you!’

Winifred / Chorus: And the boy guessed right the very first time,
He guessed right away that he’d got to take a flat,
A husband always has to think of that!

Winifred: That boy got married in a year or so,
He found her a treasure of a wife,
They lived in a happy little flat you know,
Theirs was a happy little life.
And one fine morning people came and said,
That they’d got to show him something new,
And they let him have a peep,
At a bundle half asleep,
Saying ‘Guess what we’ve got for you!’

Winifred / Chorus: And the boy guessed right the very first time,
He knew by the sound it was not a pussy cat,
It’s funny how he came to think of that!